Contents
INTRODUCTION
What is operating system (OS) ?
A operating system is a system software that act as an interface between computer users and computer hardware. Every user is not familiar with machine level language so in the absence of operating system, it will be very difficult for user to communicate with the system hardware.
What is real time operating system (RTOS) ?
A real time operating system is generally designed for real time application where data are processed without buffering a delay. A real time task should have very low response time with precise timing and high degree of reliability.
Processor core can execute one program at any one interval of time but in RTOS due to rapid switching between the individual programming task it gives impression that multiple programs are executing simultaneously at that particular interval of time.
The major features of Real Time Operating System are:
- Task management
- Resource Allocation
- Interrupt Handling
- Scheduling
FREE Real Time Operating System (FREE RTOS) ?
Free RTOS is open source real time operating system kernel which is developed by real time engineer Ltd. Microcontrollers are developed with a limited resources so, we need a operating system as per the available resources therefore we can say Free RTOS is specially designed for microcontrollers. FreeRTOS therefore provides the core real time scheduling functionality, inter-task communication, timing and synchronisation primitives only.